Celeron

The Celeron is a discontinued series of IA-32 and x86-64 computer microprocessors targeted at low-cost personal computers, manufactured by Intel from 1998 to 2023.

The first Celeron-branded CPU was introduced on April 15, 1998, and was based on the Pentium II. Starting with the Prescott Celeron D and Conroe Celeron M, Celeron processors have supported both 32-bit and 64-bit x86 software. They typically include smaller CPU caches and fewer features, resulting in lower performance compared to Intel’s mainstream brands Pentium or Core. While some Celeron designs have achieved strong performance for their segment, the majority of the Celeron line has exhibited noticeably degraded performance. Intel’s higher-end brands command premium prices in part because they offer larger caches and advanced features that Celeron processors lack.

In September 2022, Intel announced that the Celeron brand, along with Pentium, were to be replaced with the new "Intel Processor" branding for low-end processors starting on January 1, 2023. The Celeron had two cores, but the N100 has four cores. The maximum operating clock is 3.40GHz, the TDP is 6W. The maximum RAM capacity is 16GB.

Background

As a product concept, the Celeron was introduced in response to Intel's loss of the low-end market, in particular to the Cyrix 6x86, the AMD K6, and the IDT Winchip. Intel's existing low-end product, the Pentium MMX, was no longer performance-competitive at 233 MHz. Although a faster Pentium MMX would have been a lower-risk strategy, the industry-standard Socket 7 platform hosted a market of competitor CPUs that could be drop-in replacements for the Pentium MMX. Instead, Intel pursued a budget part that was to be pin-compatible with their high-end Pentium II product, using the Pentium II's proprietary Slot 1 interface.